Peter Sellers Saturdays #5: "The Magic Christian" (1969)

The story: Eccentric gazillionaire Guy Grand (Sellers) has apparently gone off his rocker. He adopts a homeless hippie (Ringo Starr) and embarks on a series of increasingly surreal practical jokes aimed to show the lengths people will go to for money -- humiliating themselves in various ways to get a handful of Guy's vast fortune.

Who's Sellers: Guy Grand. With his floppy hair, tweedy mustache, sad eyes and false good humor, Sellers does what he can with a horribly weak script to give the character life and motivation. I kind of saw Sellers playing him as a man who's done everything, who's been a debauched scoundrel, and who's now just going for sheer crazy kicks. Basically, though, he's a shit-stirrer, doing things like buying a vastly expensive painting to destroy it in front of a snooty art dealer, or filling a vat with urine, feces and money and seeing who'll dive in for the cash.

So how is it: How much more 1969 could this movie be? None more 1969. This is one of those Sellers movies that has a pretty bad reputation on a lot of fronts, but y'know, once I got into its anarchistic spirit, I kinda dug it. There's next to no character development and the plot just kind of lurches from skit to skit -- who is Guy Grand and why has he gone off his rocker? Why does "Junior" just blindly follow along with him? But there's a verve and lunacy to it all that makes it fun to watch, which a lot of other similarly "madcap" '60s flicks never quite managed. Ringo is, well, being Ringo basically, but his deadpan I'll-go-along-with-anything cheer plays well off Sellers. Great soundtrack, too, with Badfinger and Thunderclap Newman galore. It takes a while to really take off, but by the time Christopher Lee pops up on a cruise ship in a Dracula suit, you kind of just go with the flow.

While it's a sloppy, freewheeling and highly blatant piece of hippie kitsch satire, there's a bit of fun if you're in the right mood to be had in watching Sellers & Starr so eagerly puncture the hypocrisies of the uptight squares of 1969 London. With tighter direction and more emphasis on actual characterization it could've been a protest era classic, but as it is it's nowhere near as bad or lazy as some of Sellers' other misfires from this era. The biggest problem is that, like a lot of 1960s idealism, it offers a lot of attacks on a system but little in the way of solutions. Some other reviews point to this film as a forgotten link between the "Goon Show" comedy era of Sellers' early career to the world of Monty Python in the 1970s. (Pythons Graham Chapman and an amusing, already-officious young John Cleese appear in cameos here too to extend the connection. There's a ton of other cameos including Raquel Welch, Roman Polanski and Yul Brynner. Reportedly John Lennon even pops up but I didn't see him.) It's a failure as a "message movie," but "The Magic Christian" is still entertaining.

Grade: B+

Quote: "I just wanted to see if you had your price … most of us do." - Guy Grand

Peter Sellers Saturdays #4: "The Millionairess" (1960)

The story: Based loosely on a play by George Bernard Shaw, "The Millionairess" is the tale of a spoiled young heiress, Epifania (Sophia Loren), who is unlucky in love. She meets the quiet, altruistic Indian doctor Kabir (Sellers) and decides this good-hearted man is for her, but she has to follow conditions in her father's will that her future husband be able to make vast sums of money. Hijinks ensue.

Who's Sellers: In what would be a dry run for his Indian character in "The Party" a few years later, Sellers is Kabir, a humanitarian doctor who doesn't care about money and who finds Epifania's ostentatious wealth offputting. Playing the straight man, Sellers is a bright spot in a rather plodding movie, as he makes Kabir genuinely kind and sincere, yet a bit too idealistic to be believed. But the comedy in the movie is left to a rather shrill Loren, and his character is shoehorned into a totally unconvincing romance that never comes off. Notably, in "real life" Sellers became obsessed with the gorgeous Loren, ruining his first marriage over her. It's a shame that obsessive chemistry never really shows on screen.

So how is it: A rather big misfire, one of those self-conscious movies where abrasive is confused with quirky. While Loren is fun to look at and utterly gorgeous, her character is a hugely unappealing spoiled brat, and Sellers is so damped down as the upright doctor that he barely registers sometimes. There's few things more disheartening than a romantic comedy where two actors with very little chemistry acting in highly melodramatic ways are shoved down an audience's throats, and that's what "The Millionairess" is. There's some moments that are amusing -- Epifania heads into a dingy sweatshop and manages to turn it into a hugely successful business in about ten minutes, and there's an enormously risque scene for 1960 where Loren strips down to her undergarments -- but the overall sluggish pace and a hit-you-over-the-head message that "money isn't everything" make this one a bit of an ordeal to sit through today. Not Sellers' best by a long shot.

Grade: C-

Quote:
Epifania Parerga: "You don't understand, I'm killing myself."
Dr. Ahmed el Kabir: "Well, it is our common destiny, good day."

Peter Sellers Saturdays #3: Two Way Stretch (1960)

The story: "Two Way Stretch" is set in a small British prison, where life is pretty comfortable for inmate Dodger Lane (Sellers) and his cellmates. They've worked the system so cozily that they even get daily deliveries of groceries. They're near the end of their sentences, and an old criminal chum hatches a cunning plot to have Dodger and pals break out of jail for one night, make a heist, and then sneak back into jail so they can have a perfect alibi.

Who's Sellers? Dodger Lane, a small-time Cockney criminal with big dreams and oily charm, whose shameless toadying and ability to work the angles have given him a smooth time of jail.

So how is it: As one of Sellers' earlier flicks, in "Two Way Stretch" he takes a bit of a back seat to a cast of colourful British supporting actors. There's no disguises or wacky slapstick to the extent you'd see in his later films, but "Two Way Stretch" is also a showcase for how well Sellers could fit into one character. Dodger Lane is an unrepentant criminal to the bone, a lazy, self-satisfied thief who's always looking for an easy fix, and Sellers, in his "heavy" stage, sinks right into the character. The scenes of how Lane and his jail cellmates have set up a cozy little nest, complete with tea services, are quite funny, and there are some great supporting turns. But "Stretch" is also a rather thin premise for a film; although it's quite short, it feels a bit padded.

Sellers nearly has the film stolen out from under him by the late Lionel Jeffries as the constantly shouting Chief Crout, the hard-as-nails warder who takes over the undisciplined prison. Jeffries is a riot, all barely-contained rage, nearly choking on his lines. He's a prototype of R. Lee Ermey in "Full Metal Jacket," an authority figure driven mad by the slackness of his charges. Some of the other actors don't do quite as well but Bernard Cribbins is also sly fun as the aged criminal disguised as a kindly visiting priest. All in all, though, it's a fun and breezy British crime caper.

Grade: B-

Quote: "Silence when you're talking to me!" -- Chief Crout

Peter Sellers Saturdays #2: The Party (1968)

Here's the only time Peter Sellers collaborated with director Blake Edwards outside of the "Pink Panther" series. Like those films, Sellers plays a clumsy foreigner with a goofy accent, but 1968's "The Party" has a distinctly different tone than the Inspector Clouseau capers.

The story: A bumbling Indian actor is fired after botching a big Hollywood film, but ends up accidentally invited to a glamourous party at his producer's house. Hijinks ensue.

Who's Sellers? Hrundi V. Bakshi, a kind-hearted but highly accident-prone Indian actor in Hollywood. Now, Sellers playing an Indian is the biggest problem in watching "The Party" today. You couldn't really get away with a white actor slapping a bunch of makeup on and playing a minority in 2011; even 40 years ago it was probably a bit tacky. So there is that uncomfortable squirm element to watch "The Party" today, as Sellers comes close to racial caricature. But yet, despite the "brownface" factor, I found Hrindi a sympathetic character -- Sellers, whose impersonation of an Indian is pretty remarkable, tries not to make him a total stereotype. Part of the fun of "The Party" is watching this shy, courtly, repressed outsider find his bliss.

So how is it: Amusing as it is, "The Party" takes a little while to truly get going -- but director Blake Edwards clearly means the stilted, dry early party scenes to contrast with the unfettered anarchy that spills out in the final act. A dull mogul's gathering turns into a freaky happening. There's a lot of funny gags here (the drunken waiter manages to upstage Sellers in several scenes), yet "The Party" is really lacking in plot or character development. Sellers makes Hrindi likeable, but we know next to nothing about him other than that he's a bad actor from India. His "love interest," a French singer, is even less developed. It's a series of skits strung together with a loose structure. The plot swerves hard when a previously unmentioned daughter of the film producer and a gang of the cleanest-cut hippies you've ever seen storm the house in the final scenes.

Yet what I really liked about "The Party" is how successfully in its early scenes it captures the feeling of being the only outsider at a party, of being the aimless guy shuffling about trying to find a conversation to get into. This stillness is where Sellers really excels, that outsider sensation compounded by Hrindi's foreignness. And as an example of that distinctly '60s film genre -- uptight squares get their hippie-fried comeuppance -- it's a fun if slightly awkward time capsule today.

Grade: B+

Quote: "Birdie num num?" (Of course!)

Peter Sellers Saturdays: "The Mouse That Roared" (1959)

I love Peter Sellers -- when I was a kid, one of my favorite movie series was the mad anarchy of the "Pink Panther" films. I've always been vaguely fascinated by Sellers, his remarkable chameleon acting skills, his chaotic personal life and his sadly early death at 54. Sellers made a gigantic body of work in a short life, appearing in more than 60 movies, many of them apparently kinda awful. I've been trying to catch up with many of the ones I've never seen or haven't seen in years. So let's start with "The Mouse That Roared," a cold-war comedy that's a bit like a dress rehearsal for the superior "Dr. Strangelove" a few years later.

The story: Tiny European nation Grand Fenwick is facing bankruptcy. Fenwick's prime minister hatches a sneaky plot for Fenwick to "invade" America and lose, thus opening itself up to millions in financial aid (think Iraq or Afghanistan today). But thanks to a fumbling army leader and a top-secret doomsday device nothing goes quite to plan, and Grand Fenwick ends up becoming the most powerful nation in the world.

Who's Sellers?: Sellers plays three characters here: the nation's dotty head of state, Grand Duchess Gloriana XII; the sinister Prime Minister Count Rupert Mountjoy, and bumbling army leader Tully Bascombe. Awkward-but-courageous Tully, a kind of Woody Allen-lite, gets the most screen time, although I think my favorite Sellers here is the sneering Count, all mustache and cunning plans. Following in the footsteps of his idol Alec Guinness, Sellers makes each of the Fenwickians distinct characters, never making his multiple roles seem just like a gimmick like, say, Eddie Murphy does.

So how is it? "Mouse" is kind of a Mad magazine version of Cold War satire, with many similarities in plot to "Strangelove". The movie is hugely implausible (so everyone in New York City is hiding in bomb shelters and basements over some air raid drill when Fenwick invades?), but there's an amiable charm to it. It's never a very pointed satire, nowhere near as mad and inspired as "Strangelove," but the idea that a handful of bumblers from a flyspeck nation could somehow hold the balance of world power is still amusing. But the story has a lot of missed potential, settling instead for cliches. Bombshell Jean Seberg is horribly mismatched as a love interest for Sellers, although she's great to look at. It's also funny to see William Hartnell, aka The First Doctor Who, as Tully's stern aide. At 80 minutes "Mouse" doesn't wear out its welcome, and although it's a rather dated piece of satire now, there's enough gentle humour in it to make it bearable. And Sellers' capacity for playing multiple characters never stops being amazing.

Rating: B-

Quote: "There isn't a more profitable undertaking for any country than to declare war on the United States and to be defeated."